Topline
Eric Trump on Wednesday said he thinks his father, President Donald Trump, “deserves” to have his Scottish golf course Turnberry host The Open Championship and said he thinks politics are the only reason it hasn’t happened.
President Donald Trump reacts as he plays golf at the Trump Turnberry Golf Course on July 27, 2025.
Eric Trump told BBC Sport "there's no one that has been better for the game of golf" than his father and both the course and the president "deserve" to have the storied tournament at Turnberry.
He said thinks Trump's passion for the game "will be rewarded" with another chance to host The Open, though it won’t be until he is no longer president.
The course, which Trump bought in 2014 for some $60 million and renamed Trump Turnberry, is famous for its history of hosting Open Championships, but hasn't been the site of the tournament since 2009.
The head of The R&A, the global governing body of golf, in 2021 said The Open would not be held at Turnberry again while Trump is associated with the venue, but last year a new CEO said the organization was "doing some feasibility work" around a potential return.
Mark Darbon, chief of the R&A, has said work needs to be done on nearby road, rail and accommodation infrastructure before Turnberry could host The Open again, but Trump said Wednesday, "You could host the Open Championship on that course tomorrow” calling it “impeccable."
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"I think the elephant in the room was, frankly, politics, for a very long time," Eric Trump said when asked why Turnberry had been snubbed as host for The Open in recent years.
Trump visited Scotland last week to open a new golf course in Aberdeenshire, on Scotland’s east coast. While there, he hosted British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at Turnberry, where they discussed tariffs and the wars in Gaza and Ukraine. Starmer called the venue "absolutely magnificent both inside and out." Turnberry, which is more than 100 years old, is one of 10 courses on the rotation to host the Open Championship. Turnberry's first time hosting The Open ended in a famous battle between Tom Watson and Jack Nicklaus in 1977 that became known as "Duel in the Sun." It also hosted the event in 1986, 1996 and 2009. Turberry was on track to host in 2020 but ultimately wasn’t chosen after Trump announced his bid for the presidency.
$200 million. That’s how much the Trump organization has spent to renovate the property, but Trump Turnberry has reportedly struggled to turn a profit since his company purchased it in 2014. Turnberry lost $1.7 million in the 2023 fiscal year. But Eric Trump on Wednesday said: "Here's the good news. We don't give a damn, right. This is our Mona Lisa. If we spent $100 million and never got a penny back, it doesn't make any difference. We wanted to do something incredible."
When Trump stays at his own properties, the government pays those properties to house members of the president's security detail and White House staff. In 2018, Trump stayed at Turnberry for two nights during a visit to Scotland and played two rounds of golf before departing for the Helsinki Summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin. That trip cost taxpayers almost $1 million, according to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, including $68,000 in expenses paid directly to Trump Turnberry. The expenditures, paid for by the State Department, were labeled "hotel rooms." The State Department spent another $13,000 at Turnberry between November 2016 through May 2017, ABC News reported.